Libation of the Week: Peace Tree Root Beer

Name: Peace Tree Root Beer

 

Brand: Peace Tree Brewing Co.

Place of Purchase: Ulrich's Meat Market in Pella, IA

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Country/Region of Origin: Knoxville, IA

Tasting Conditions: Chilled and bottled

Price in Iowa: $1.99

Description: a frothy, amber brew

Flavors: Caramel, vanilla, possibly sorghum, metallic undertones

Mouth-feel: Bubbly and heady

Aroma: Vanilla and caramel

Notes:I picked this root beer up one day when I was meat and bakery shopping in Pella.  It initially had a nice rich flavor, but the metallic flavors began to overpower everything.  I'm not sure if it is brewed in metal kegs or if something else is adding the flavor, but I didn't like it about half-way through the bottle.

Cheese of the week: Cave-aged Roquefort

Name: Cave-aged Roquefort

Brand: Societe des Caves

Place of Purchase: Wheatsfield Organic Co-op in Ames, Iowa

Country/Region of Origin: France

Price in Iowa: $29.07/lb.

Milk: sheep's milk

Processing: Sheep's milk and roquefort cultures, with cave-aging for at least 6 months

Texture: soft

Color: bone white and forest green

Rind: natural

Aroma: strong bleu and dairy

Taste: Sharp bleu flavors followed by cool creamy notes.

Mouth feel: SUPER creamy
 
Notes:This cheese was so good that I forgot to take a picture.  Now, I love bleu cheeses.  If I had one type of cheese to eat for the rest of my life, it would be bleu.  This Roquefort is the best bleu cheese I have ever had.  Find it.  Buy it.  Share it if you have to, but even my wife didn't get any of mine.

Cheese of the week: Pleasant Ridge Reserve Farmstead Cheese

Name: Pleasant Ridge Reserve Farmstead Cheese

Brand: Uplands Cheese Company

Place of Purchase: Wheatsfield Organic Co-op in Ames, Iowa

Country/Region of Origin: Dodgeville, WI

Price in Iowa: $22.50/lb.

Milk: pasture-fed raw cow's milk

Processing: Curd formed with enzyme and cultures, cave-aged 4 months, washed with brine and cultures

Texture: Firm

Color: Straw yellow to tan

Rind: Washed/Natural

Aroma: Strong dairy

Taste: Sharp dairy, nutty, fruity

Mouth feel: firm and unyielding, but not chewy
 
Notes: I bough this cheese because it was the last slice of the wheel.  Apparently, I'm the last fromagophile to get to the store.  This cheese was tasty, but I left about 1/4-inch near the rind because it was too firm to enjoy.  This cheese has a tight paste, think Parmesan, but it holds together well.  The flavor profile is pretty complex, too.  I'm not sure what magic they're working up in Dodgeville, but they're making a really delicious cheese.

Name: Jarlsberg Special Reserve

Brand: none listed

Place of Purchase: Wheatsfield Organic Co-op in Ames, Iowa

Country/Region of Origin: Norway

Price in Iowa: $8.33/lb.

Milk: skim milk

Processing: Press the curd and age for at least one year.

Texture: Semi-Firm (with small to medium holes)

Color: Pale yellow

Rind: Wax

Aroma: Sharp and sweet.

Taste: Nutty, warm, sweet dairy

Mouth feel: Firm and unyielding
 
Notes: Yummy yummy yummy.  I want to make grilled cheese sandwiches with this.  I also enjoyed the slight squeak that the cheese made when you chew it.  That's the one thing that I love about fresh cheese curds, and now I can get my squeak on with Jarlsberg.

Fruit of the week: Ackee

Name: Jamaican Ackees

Brand: Nature Farms

Place of Purchase: Lucky Dragon (Ting's) Grocery in Des Moines, Iowa

Country/Region of Origin: Jamaica

Price in Iowa: $9.95 for 540 grams

Description: Weird.  Imagine a can full of runny scrambled eggs.

Flavor: Salty with floral and asparagus notes, with an allium aftertaste.

Aroma: Asparagus and grass

Texture/Mouth-feel: Soft and runny in the brine.  The fruit pieces themselves were very yielding, like tofu.

Notes: I will admit that this fruit scared the crap out of me.  Not only does it look like scrambled eggs in a can, but improperly prepared ackee fruits are toxic.


So, I ate a little.  And it was good.  I think that you need to do something savory with this fruit, though.  For example, salt fish and ackees is the national dish of Jamaica.  So, tomorrow night I'm going to slice up some tomatoes, onions and peppers and mix them with ackees.  Then, I'm going to pour them over a nice piece of cod.


I expect good things.

Libations of the Week: Ski and Cheerwine

 Name: Ski

 

Brand: Double Cola Company

Place of Purchase: Some gas station in Joelton, TN

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Country/Region of Origin: Tennessee, USA

Tasting Conditions: Chilled

Price in Iowa: $1.59

Description: a neon green, sparkling drink

Flavors: Sweet orange and sour lemon

Mouth-feel: Bubbly and acidic.

Aroma: Lemons and oranges

Notes: I had never heard of Ski, but it's apparently popular all over the Southeast and in Southern Illinois.  This stuff is pretty potent.  The natural sweet orange essence and lemon flavors create a unique citrus flavor that is very good when chilled.  However, either due to these flavors or the high caffeine content, this soda is very acidic.  It started to make my cheeks tingle, so I stopped drinking the bottle halfway through.  Still, it wok me up and had a great flavor profile.

Name: Cheerwine

 

Brand: Carolina Beverage Company

Place of Purchase: Some gas station in Brunswick, GA

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Country/Region of Origin: USA

Tasting Conditions: Chilled

Price in Iowa: $2.50

Description: a bright red carbonated beverage

Flavors: Short-lived cherry flavor followed by metallic/mineral notes

Mouth-feel: Very bubbly

Aroma: Cherries and berries

Notes: I was pretty excited to get my hands on some Cheerwine.  This mystical Southern libation has achieved legendary status in my mind.  I was lucky to find the glass-bottled variety, which is sweetened with cane sugar.  Unfortunately, Cheerwine isn't that great.  The cherry flavors, while intense, only lasted a few moments.  Then I was left with a mouthful of red, carbonated, North Carolina-flavored water.  I think I prefer the mouth-burn of Ski.

Fruit of the week: Honey Red Dates

Name: Honey Red Dates

Brand: Ah Jiao

Place of Purchase: Uni-Mart Korean Grocery in Ames, Iowa

Country/Region of Origin: South Korea

 

Price in Iowa: $1.89 for 200 grams of fruit

Description: Big, sticky red raisins

Flavor: Very sweet, with a meaty, mealy flavor underneath

Aroma: They smell like honey

Texture/Mouth-feel: Sticky exterior, the skin is rigid with a good snap to it, the interior is mostly hollow.  Most of the fruit is attached to the skin.

Notes: I picked these up at the Korean grocery when I was stocking up on ginseng and Katsu sauce.  I knew that the flavor would be nothing like the actual fruit, but there were a number of varieties so I decided to try one.  They were very good.  This candied "date" is actually a dried jujube.  Typically in Korea, the candied variety is eaten with tea (or in tea), but there are a variety of other dishes that use the dried fruit (some sort of cake made from dried jujubes, tamarind, chilies and jaggery that sounds fantastic).  These were a nice treat, but I could only eat a few of them.  Very very sweet.